Alright, let’s do this.

Thank you for reaching out to strengthen our movement at this critical moment. It’s so important that we show our resolve and commitment after Tim’s sentencing.
The best way to bring people into the movement is to reach out to them with a personal appeal. Email is good – a phone call is great – but you should use whatever you think is the best way to reach the people in your community. The important thing is to spread the word.
When you reach out to folks, remember to direct them to www.tarsandsaction.org/sign-up to get them in the loop with the action.
You know the best way to talk to your friends, family and community members, but here are a few key facts that you can use to explain the situation:

Not long from now, President Obama will be deciding whether to allow a Canadian company to build the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. Because it’s an international permit, he has the authority to stop it, without Congressional approval. The ball is in his court.

Resistance to the pipeline is growing – over 1,000 people have committed to take part in a sit-in at the White House – but it might not be enough. Big oil, including the Koch Brothers, are behind the project, and they’re building up an intense campaign to approve the pipeline before November, which means we need to act now, and act boldly.

Stopping this pipeline is critical to eventually defusing the tar sands, the largest carbon bomb in North America. Keystone XL will carry oil from the Canadian tar sands, the largest and most destructive industrial project in history. Burning all the oil in the tar sands will mean “essentially game over” for the world’s climate, according to NASA climatologist James Hansen.

The Keystone XL pipeline will pump hundreds of thousands of barrels of the dirtiest oil in the world over America’s largest aquifer, across hundreds of waterways, ending up at refineries on the Gulf Coast. Tar sands oil is dirtier, heavier, and more toxic than regular oil, and the risk of spills is extra-high because tar sands oil is more corrosive than regular crude.

It’s up to us to put the pressure on Obama. EPA administrator Lisa Jackson said recently that the President isn’t taking aggressive action on climate because environmentalists are “not marching on Washington the way they did on Earth Day in the ’70s.” We need to step up now to stop the rapid warming of the planet.

The political process is bankrupt, but our consumer society’s habits of the heart also resist the fundamental changes circumstances dictate. At some point, the severity of climatic conditions will overcome denial: our task is to advance that day, before it is too late.

In addition to the evidence of climate change, we have ugly reminders of tanker and pipeline spills over recent decades. We must challenge the power of corporations who pump and ship oil, oblivious of the devastation they are causing. We can overcome these giants if we unite in spirit, media and determination.

It is critical that more people get the information about the tar sands, especially the photographs.I believe that most reasonable people do not want to pollute our planet, that they want a future for their children and grandchildren, and that they would support STOPPING the Keystone XL pipeline.